A bachelor’s degree used be all you needed to secure a bright future for yourself. Now, its just enough to get you an entry level job. On top of that, unless you got a full scholarship, you’re starting off your adult life in drowning in student loan debt that will eat away at your income for the unforeseeable future.
In the information age, we are continually overwhelmed by an increasing amount of content, while increasingly starving for knowledge. For the first time in human history, we have instant access to the largest library ever known to man. Yet we spend most of our time scrolling through memes.
“A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention”
-Herbert A. Simon
In the digital renaissance, can now make yourself irreplaceable by learning a number of valuable evergreen skills for free, at your own pace. Instead of piling up student loan debt just for a chance to get your foot in the door, you can excel in your zone of genius.
But you have to develop the self-discipline to filter our the noise and take control of your attention. Embrace the intellectual discomfort of learning things that are a little more difficult than you’re comfortable doing.
In the world of weight training, there is method called progressive overload where you gradually increase the amount of stress you’re putting on your muscles, whether by increasing weight, reps, or both.
Similarly, you need to train the cognitive muscle of your mind by gradually increasing your level of learning difficulty.
A writer named Scott Young is famous for teaching himself the entire 4 year MIT computer science in under a year. He was also able to teach himself to draw in a month and learn new languages by refraining from speaking English for an entire year.
He calls this concept ultralearning, which he defines as “a strategy for acquiring skills and knowledge that is both self-directed and intense”.
Ultralearning employs these 9 principles to accelerate learning.
1. Metalearning
2. Focus
3. Directness
4. Drill
5. Retrieval
6. Feedback
7. Retention
8. Intuition
9. Experimentation
To me, this looks like a list of ADHD traits. I will cover what each of these principles entails another time, but I believe the practice of ultralearning can be leveraged more effectively by those of us who are divergent thinkers.
But the first step is training your mind to become uncomfortable with mindless content consumption and crave deep learning. Then ultralearning can become your life-long supply of dopamine.
Thank you for reading, my friend.
Stay curious for life.
-Tony